Medela Little Hearts Breastpump
In a world of quite sophisticated breastpumps, with "smartcards" and electronic wizardry embedded in them, and others with heavy-duty motors and rugged battery paks that can go on working non-stop for quite some time; the Medela Little Hearts Manual Breastpump appears quite incongruous. But its beauty lies in its simplicity and ease of use.
The pump has no ambitions of competing with the hospital-grade variety. It feels quite out-of-place in the hands of demanding mothers who have frequent expression requirements which have to be completed quite fast, too! Instead, Little Hearts is completely at home with the stay-at-home mother, who has only occasional use for pumping, as she is always around the child, available to nurse whenever the hunger pangs begin. Perhaps the mother has to go out somewhere for a very short period of time, and might be late in returning? Well, she can express her milk using this cute little pump, store the milk in the refrigerator, and instruct the person taking care of the baby in her absence to feed her child on time.
Little Hearts is manually operated; it does not require any electricity or batteries to function. The unit is quite easy to assemble and disassemble, as one might expect. A regular size breastshield is connected to a vacuum regulator and valve and membrane mechanism, which in turn connects to the milk container. A cylinder and seal are connected to the piston at the other end of the breastshield. This is how simple it is.
The vacuum regulator is used to suckle at the breast tissues near the nipple and the areola. Initially,
the regulator may be set to "MIN". Gradually, as you start pumping, the regulator ring may be turned
towards "MAX". This tells you the vacuum pressure that you are most comfortable with. The initial
pumping stimulates the breasts, enough for the milk to begin flowing. The higher the vacuum that
can be maintained, without compromising your comfort, the better the flow will result. After about
five minutes of pumping, the device may be switched to the other breast. This back and forth
switching should continue several times, till such time that the breasts feel to be sufficiently empty.
An average of about half an hour is taken
for one such pumping session, using Little Hearts.
Sometimes the suction appears to be low, or not present at all. This might be usually due to some leakage in the cylinder / piston fittings, or the valve / container fittings. In such a case, you may disassemble the unit and reassemble it again, this time fastly securing the connections. Another reason could be that the membrane is not lying flat on the surface of the valve connected to the breastshield; resulting in the air escaping. The shield may be removed, and the valve and membrane rechecked. If neither seems to be the case, and the valve and the membrane appear to be clean too, then it is best to contact the nearest customer care center of Medela for further help. The company provides a ninety-day warranty on Little Hearts.
The container containing the expressed milk may be kept at room temperature also. Such milk is best consumed within four hours. However, if you expect to be away for a day or more, sufficient quantity of milk should be expressed and stored in the refrigerator, where it gets preserved without worry for upto five days. Milk kept in the freezer section of the refrigerator can remain fit for consumption for upto three to four months, too! Just ensure that, when it is time for the frozen milk to be thawed, the container is kept under warm water, and never to use any microwave equipment, which might unevenly heat up the milk.